Brainwashing or Stockholm Syndrome?

One thing that I have always failed to understand is how people who are maltreated by the very holy texts they hold to manage to stay part of that religion...  If this god character was really omniscient, omnipotent, and in particular omni-benevolent, wouldn't his morality be better than our own?  And haven't we struggled with our own morality for all of recorded history to make sure that humans are indeed treated with respect, fairness, and basic dignity regardless of the colour of their skin or the shape of their genitalia?

So in the West, the christian bible is revered for some reason, yet it has horrible moral lessons in terms of slavery and sexism.  So I have always wondered if women and African-Americans who are deeply religious are brainwashed to not pay attention to the horrible sexism and instructions on slavery, or do they suffer some sort of Stockholm syndrome?  I have mentioned this before, but I want to drive this particular point home with both sections covered here.

Let's take a look at sexism.

Look for places in the bible where god is an absurd, unmitigated jerk instead of the "all-knowing", "all-loving", "fully-enlightened" being that he is supposed to be.  There are many parts of the bible that display these tendencies. However, if you are a woman, the place where god's absurdity becomes completely clear is when you look at god's sexism.

The dictionary defines a misogynist as "One who hates women." [ref] It defines the word "sexist" as:

1. Discrimination based on gender, especially discrimination against women.
2. Attitudes, conditions, or behaviors that promote stereotyping of social roles based on gender

Is god a sexist? Let's look at the evidence. We find this in 1 Corinthians chapter 14:

As in all the congregations of the saints, women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the Law says. If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church.

This seems like a straightforward passage. And god is the one who inspired the bible. In Isaiah 40:8 god says that the word of the lord will last forever, and he says the same thing again in 1 Peter 1:24-25. So here we have god, in his eternal and everlasting word, saying that it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church.

This quote from 1 Corinthians 11 is important:

But I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of a woman is her husband, and the head of Christ is God. Any man who prays or prophesies with his head covered dishonors his head, but any woman who prays or prophesies with her head unveiled dishonors her head--it is the same as if her head were shaven. For if a woman will not veil herself, then she should cut off her hair; but if it is disgraceful for a woman to be shorn or shaven, let her wear a veil. For a man ought not to cover his head, since he is the image and glory of God; but woman is the glory of man. (For man was not made from woman, but woman from man. Neither was man created for woman, but woman for man.) That is why a woman ought to have a veil on her head, because of the angels.

You may find it hard to believe that something that confusing is in the bible, yet if you look it up you will find it is there.

Then there is this section from 1 Timothy chapter 2:

Also that women should adorn themselves modestly and sensibly in seemly apparel, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or costly attire but by good deeds, as befits women who profess religion. Let a woman learn in silence with all submissiveness. I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over men; she is to keep silent.

It is hard to miss god's meaning when he says something as direct as, "I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over men; she is to keep silent."

If you think about it, you will realize that god started this type of sexism at the very beginning of the bible. In Genesis chapter 17 God says:

This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your descendants after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised. You shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you.

God makes no mention of forming any sort of covenant with women.

There are many other examples that we can find in the Bible:

• In Matthew 25:1 Jesus says: "At that time the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom."
• In John 20:17 Jesus says to Mary: "Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father," as though the touch of a woman is somehow improper, but a few verses later, is happy to have Thomas touch him.
• In Genesis chapter 3, God punishes Eve, and all women for thousands of years, with greatly increased pain during childbirth. No such pain is inflicted on Adam.
• In Ephesians 5:22-24 we find this: "Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything."
• In 1 Peter 3:7 we find: "Husbands, in the same way be considerate as you live with your wives, and treat them with respect as the weaker partner and as heirs with you of the gracious gift of life, so that nothing will hinder your prayers."
• In 1 John 2:13, John says, "I write to you, fathers, because you have known him who is from the beginning. I write to you, young men, because you have overcome the evil one. I write to you, dear children, because you have known the Father." No mention is made of women.
• And so on. There are many, many examples like these throughout the old and new testaments.

There are other, broader examples of misogyny that are readily apparent in the Bible as well:

• Are any of Jesus' disciples women? No.
• Are any of the elders in the book of Revelation women? No.
• Are any of the books of the Bible written by women? No.
• Etc...

God, it would seem, wants nothing to do with women.

Keep in mind that the bible's misogyny has affected society for centuries. The United States constitution, for example, was originally drafted to specifically deny rights to women. Women could not even vote in the United States until 1920, and only then after decades of battle in the women's suffrage movement.

If you think about it, you will realize that there is something quite odd about this situation. In spite of the fact that the bible is supposed to be god's eternal Word, modern human beings totally reject god's sexism. Modern human beings completely ignore god:

• We make women the CEOs of major corporations.
• We elect women to high government offices.
• We appoint women as presidents of universities.
• We fill our schools with female teachers.
• We allow women to speak freely in church.

The contradiction should be as obvious as a lighthouse here. There is no ambiguity. We do all of this in direct defiance of god's Law in the bible because we know god and his "eternal word" are completely wrong. We know that god is imaginary.

If god is going to take the time to write and publish "the Word of God," why does the book contain so many problems?

• Why isn't each page of the Bible astonishing us with its brilliance and insight, and filling us with wonder?
• Why, instead, does the Bible contain so much nonsense or, in this case, bigotry?
• Why are christians constantly having to justify, rationalize, excuse and explain the bible? In this case, we find modern christians trying to defend a god who obviously hates women on many different levels.

To any unbiased observer, the reason for sexism in the bible is very easy to understand: The bible was not written by a "all-knowing", "all-loving", "fully-enlightened" "god". It was written by primitive men who were flagrant sexists. Just look at how men in primitive countries like Afghanistan treat women today. Those are the kind of men who wrote the Bible.
 
And we all know it -- christians and non-christians alike. The reason why modern societies totally reject sexism is because we all know that the bible's sexism is completely contradictory and completely wrong. It is exactly the same situation we see when christians face slavery in the bible. Christians and non-christians alike reject the bible's teachings in these areas because the bible is obviously wrong. The part that is profoundly strange is that, while completely rejecting these parts of the bible, christians will claim that other parts of the bible are god's word. They are blind to the obvious contradiction because of their utter delusion.

Okay, what about slavery?

Here are ten passages from the Bible that clearly demonstrate God's position on slavery:

Genesis chapter 17, verse 12:

And he that is eight days old shall be circumcised among you, every man child in your generations, he that is born in the house, or bought with money of any stranger, which is not of thy seed. He that is born in thy house, and he that is bought with thy money, must needs be circumcised.

In this passage god understands that people buy other people and, quite obviously, is comfortable with the concept. God wants slaves circumcised in the same way as non-slaves.

Exodus chapter 12 verse 43:

The Lord said to Moses and Aaron, "These are the regulations for the Passover: No foreigner is to eat of it. Any slave you have bought may eat of it after you have circumcised him, but a temporary resident and a hired worker may not eat of it.

God again shows that he is completely comfortable with the concept of slavery and singles out slaves for special treatment.

Exodus Chapter 21, verse 1:

Now these are the ordinances which you shall set before them. When you buy a Hebrew slave, he shall serve six years, and in the seventh he shall go out free, for nothing. If he comes in single, he shall go out single; if he comes in married, then his wife shall go out with him. If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the wife and her children shall be her master's and he shall go out alone. But if the slave plainly says, 'I love my master, my wife, and my children; I will not go out free,' then his master shall bring him to God, and he shall bring him to the door or the doorpost; and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl; and he shall serve him for life.

Here god describes how to become a slave for life, and shows that it is completely acceptable to separate slaves from their families. God also shows that he completely endorses the branding of slaves through mutilation.

Exodus Chapter 21, verse 20:

If a man beats his male or female slave with a rod and the slave dies as a direct result, he must be punished, but he is not to be punished if the slave gets up after a day or two, since the slave is his property.

Not only does god condone slavery, but he is also completely comfortable with the concept of beating your slaves, as long as you don't kill them.

Exodus Chapter 21, verse 32:

If the bull gores a male or female slave, the owner must pay thirty shekels of silver to the master of the slave, and the bull must be stoned.

Not only does god condone slavery, but here god places a value on slaves -- 30 shekels of silver. Note that god is not sophisticated enough to understand the concept of inflation. It is now 3,000 years later, and a gored slave is still worth 30 shekels of silver according to god's word.

Leviticus Chapter 22, verse 10:

No one outside a priest's family may eat the sacred offering, nor may the guest of a priest or his hired worker eat it. But if a priest buys a slave with money, or if a slave is born in his household, that slave may eat his food.

Here god shows that the children of slaves are slaves themselves, and that he is completely happy with that concept.

Leviticus Chapter 25, verse 44:

Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property. You can will them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly.

Here god states where you may purchase your slaves, and clearly specifies that slaves are property to be bought, sold and handed down.

Luke, Chapter 7, verse 2:

Now a centurion had a slave who was dear to him, who was sick and at the point of death. When he heard of Jesus, he sent to him elders of the Jews, asking him to come and heal his slave. And when they came to Jesus, they besought him earnestly, saying, "He is worthy to have you do this for him, for he loves our nation, and he built us our synagogue." And Jesus went with them. When he was not far from the house, the centurion sent friends to him, saying to him, "Lord, do not trouble yourself, for I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; therefore I did not presume to come to you. But say the word, and let my servant be healed. For I am a man set under authority, with soldiers under me: and I say to one, 'Go,' and he goes; and to another, 'Come,' and he comes; and to my slave, 'Do this,' and he does it." When Jesus heard this he marveled at him, and turned and said to the multitude that followed him, "I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith." And when those who had been sent returned to the house, they found the slave well.

Here jesus shows that he is completely comfortable with the concept of slavery. Jesus heals the slave without any thought of freeing the slave or admonishing the slave's owner.

Colossians, chapter 3, verse 22:

Slaves, obey in everything those who are your earthly masters, not with eyeservice, as men-pleasers, but in singleness of heart, fearing the Lord. Whatever your task, work heartily...

Here god shows that he is in complete acceptance of a slave's position, and encourages slaves to work hard. This sentiment is repeated in Titus, chapter 2 verse 9:

Bid slaves to be submissive to their masters and to give satisfaction in every respect; they are not to be refractory, nor to pilfer, but to show entire and true fidelity.

Once again god shows that he is quite enamored of slavery.

God loves slavery
 
If the bible is written by god, and these are the words of the lord, then you can come to only one possible conclusion: God is an impressive advocate of slavery and is fully supportive of the concept.
As you can see, these slavery passages present us with an immense contradiction:

• On the one hand, we all know that slavery is an outrage and a moral abomination. As a result, slavery is now completely illegal throughout the developed world.
• On the other hand, most christians claim that the bible came from god. In god's word, the "creator of the universe" states that slavery is perfectly acceptable. Beating your slaves is fine. Enslaving children is fine. Separating slave families is fine. According to the bible, we should all be practicing slavery today.

The intensity of this contradiction is remarkable. It shows us quite clearly that god is imaginary.
If god were to exist, and if he were playing any role whatsoever on our planet, he would eliminate this connection between himself and slavery. There is no way that a loving god would allow himself to be perceived as condoning and encouraging slavery like this.

Here is the thing that I would like to help you understand: You, as a rational human being, know that slavery is wrong. You know it. That is why every single developed nation in the world has made slavery completely illegal. Human beings make slavery illegal, in direct defiance of god's word, because we all know with complete certainty that slavery is an abomination.

What does your common sense now tell you about a bible that supports slavery in both the Old and the New Testaments?

Understanding the Rationalizations

Many believers will argue that god had to talk this way in the Old Testament in order to "fit in" with the dominant culture. This, of course, is silly. In christian mythology, god is the one who created humans and human culture. In addition, a god that condones the beating of slaves and the enslavement of children at any time is an abomination.

A believer might say, "Well, all of those verses are from the Old Testament and no longer apply because of jesus." This line of rationalization prompts several obvious questions. Why would the Old Testament still be printed in the bible if jesus overturned it? Why would God EVER tell us to beat slaves?

The most important thing that this line of rationalization misses is that jesus specifically states that the laws of the Old Testament still stand. In Matthew 5:18 Jesus says:

For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth pass away, not one letter, not one stroke of a letter, will pass from the law until all is accomplished.

Then he goes on to say:

Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven; but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

According to jesus, the Old Testament is alive and well. According to Isaiah 40:8, "the word of our god stands forever." The notion that these old testament verses no longer apply is completely untrue according to the bible. Christians imagine that they "no longer apply" as a way of rationalizing their religion.

Other believers rationalize that god did not write these slavery passages in the bible. The bible was somehow corrupted by slave-loving men. In that case, the obvious question to ask yourself is this: If the bible has been corrupted, how can we possibly know which parts of the bible came from god and which parts were inserted by primitive men? You have absolutely no way to know.

It is when you start thinking about the bible in this way that you understand something very important about the bible. Either the entire bible really is god's word, or the entire bible was written by primitive men with absolutely no input from god. Here is the reason for this very strong dividing line:

If part of the  bible came from god and part came from primitive men, you do not know which is which. You do not know if jesus really is resurrected, or if that's just a make-believe story inserted by primitive men. How do you know if god wrote the Ten Commandments or not? If any part of the bible has been polluted by primitive men, you have to reject the whole thing. There is no way to know who wrote what, so the entire book is invalid.

There really is no middle ground and the bible has to be an all-or-nothing book. Either the entire bible came from god, or none of it did. With this all-or-nothing reality about the bible now understood, you can see that there are only two possible explanations for the slavery passages in the bible:

• The bible is right, and god loves slavery. The entire bible is god's word, so these slavery passages must be god's word too. The laws in the United States and other modern nations that make slavery illegal defy god's word. Justice Scalia should be promoting slavery in exactly the same way that he promotes the Ten Commandments.
• The bible condones slavery because the bible was written by slave-owning men, not by god. God is imaginary.

Chances are that you have a problem with the first explanation. God would not champion the abomination that is slavery. We all know that. Therefore, what you are left with is the second explanation. 

So what is your vote on this issue? Brainwashing or Stockholm Syndrome?

Minor Critique of Abrahamistic Religions

Just a minor critique that I saw that I wanted to pass along.

The Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) are essentially the same : schizophrenic.
We bring love and peace ... by telling you everyone else is an enemy to be avoided, hated and even killed when ordered.
We bring hope ... by telling you the world is hopeless and doomed.
We bring truth ... by telling you the most twisted lies you've ever heard.
We bring knowledge ... by telling you 'God' is the answer to every question you shouldn't ask.

I have often said they are all the same, because on the surface they really are.  I am sure there are many other things these major religious spout off that they then act in total opposition to.  Which is why Christopher Hitchens felt the need to actually confront these groups.

My heart goes out to Norway

So I just found out about a horrible event in Norway.  Absolutely heart-wrenching!  Initial speculation of course ran rampant.  The specter of a muslim extremist was the the first thought on many people's minds.  Nothing like having the worst thoughts turned to reality so that one can continue to systematically demonize the enemy.  Well, turns out it was a Norwegian.  Anders Behring Breivik, a right-wing extremist, a christian, a nationalist, and islamophobe no less. Well, that just got me thinking:

Will the news media have the panoply of talking heads on talking about how christianity is inherently a violent religion, and that it is inimical to "our way of life" ans must be contained?
Will the christian faith be viewed as one inherently violent and cruel?
Will there be demands for action that christians are to be shunned and viewed with suspision?

OF COURSE NOT!  No, imagine if the suspect had been a brown, islamic immigrant...

Now, I am not claiming that islam is innocent by any stretch of the imagination.  The list of Cruelty and Violence in their book is depressing enough as it is (although I note with irony that the christian list is nearly three times as long!).  All I am saying is that irrationally held beliefs are fertile ground for irrational action.  That really is my main problem with any and all religions.

In the meantime, do what you can for the people of Norway.

SEX and Secularism

Just saw this from the IPC Press, and thought I would share it.  This is a PRESS RELEASE of a book they are publishing.  Sadly I can't reproduce the table they included in the press release, but I found it quite a telling survey.  In particular about the poor education children of religious parents get regarding sex in general.  While the parents may think they are protecting their kids, the data CLEARLY shows they are setting them up for failure.  Again, this is the sort of anti-reality sort of stuff that has such horrible consequences, but the solution is too anti-dogmatic for them to even consider.  And the cycle of ignorance and disappointment continues.

The main points are highlighted here:

From: IPC Press,
Marketing Public Relations Dept.
15699 Kansas Ave.
Bonner Springs, KS 66012

For Release: May 15, 2011

For: Sex Improves Dramatically After Leaving Religion

Sex and Secularism: What Happens When You Leave Religion, A survey of over 14,500 American Secularists. A ground-breaking study of sexuality among the non-religious.

Contact: Dr. Darrel W. Ray
913-486-3666
publisher@ipcpress.com

www.ipcpress.com

Key findings:
1. Sex improves dramatically after leaving religion.
2. Sexual guilt has little staying power after leaving religion.
3. Those raised most religious show no difference from those raised least religious in their sexual behavior.
4. Those raised most religious experience far more guilt but have just as much sex.
5. Religious parents are far worse at educating their children on matters of sex.
6. Religious guilt differs in measurable amounts according to denomination.

This ground-breaking study surveyed over 14,500 secularists about their sex lives. This first of its kind survey looks at attitudes and behavior related to sexuality and religion including religious sexual guilt, parenting behavior, sex education and sexual satisfaction before and after leaving religion.

The most important finding shows dramatic improvement in sexual satisfaction and a decrease in guilt after people left religion. Approximately 55%% of respondents said their sex life greatly improved an 8, 9 or 10 (on a 10 pt. scale) after leaving religion while only 2.2% said it became worse.

The primary findings show that people who are religious have a good deal of guilt about sex and sexuality but their behavior is about the same as the non-religious. Guilt is a key component of religious attitudes about sex but actual behavior, whether first masturbation, first oral sex, first intercourse, etc. do not change appreciably with religiosity.

The US government has been deeply involved in abstinence only education for almost 10 years. The government’s own research shows that such programs do not work or at best, delay the onset of sexual behavior by months. Results of this survey closely mirror those of abstinence only programs. Children from religious homes don’t delay sexual activities appreciably but they feel guilty about doing it and probably know less about sex and protecting themselves, than their secular counterparts.

One key finding was a clear pattern of improvement in sexual satisfaction depending on former religious affiliation. (See chart below) Those leaving high guilt religions showed the most improvement in their sex life.

The study found guilt to be measurably different depending on the denomination. This may sound obvious, but no one has actually tried to measure this before. The study concluded that Mormons, Jehovah’s Witness, Pentecostal, Seventh Day Adventists, and Baptists are among the most guilt driven of religions with Unitarians, Atheists and Episcopalians being among the least.

In the US, many religious leaders are against sex education in schools and insist that parents and churches should be primarily responsible. Results of this survey show parents, whether religious or not, are not particularly good at talking to their children. More secular parents do talk to their children 38% of the
time to a mere 13% of religious parents. People from religious homes felt that their education in sex was poor compared to those from less religious homes.

Most religions preach strongly against pornography so it is reasonable to think that porn use would be less among the more religious. This survey found that porn use is quite high in all groups and is a key source of sex education for religious teens. The most religious teens said they got their sex education from porn 33% of the time, the less religious 25.2% of the time. The survey found that 90% of men were using pornography by age 21 with no significant difference between those most and least religious. For women, over 50% were using porn by age 21 and 70% at age 30, with little difference between most and least religious.

Religions teach against sex before marriage, but the survey found that differences between the most and least religious was negligible. Most important, religious teens said they got their sexual education from personal experience 50.2% compared to 42.4% for the less religious. In other words, children raised most religious are experimenting with sex more than those raised non-religious.

Women and men saw equal improvement after religion. Those who felt their sex life was worse gave revealing comments like:
“Since leaving religion, I have not had a physical or emotional relationship with my wife.”
“Since becoming an atheist I have not met anyone who does not have some religious or 'spiritual' belief system. As a result, life is very lonely. I am proactively meeting new single members of the opposite sex, in an effort to find someone who does not believe in the supernatural.”

Some said that religion contributed to marital problems. Those married to very religious people had the least satisfying sex lives and reported many restrictions on what was allowed, even if they had been married many years.
“Once, my wife came home from Church and announced that there will be no more oral sex because the priest said oral sex was a sodomy and she should not practice it.”
“His religiosity prevents us from having honest discussion. I feel like there is an unseen wall between us now.

The researchers expected to find those who left religion with residual effects of guilt for years after. Surprisingly, those who had been out of religion for several years reported few residual effects with great sexual satisfaction. Many indicated that leaving religion had a strong positive impact on their sexual satisfaction.

The study concludes that “biology happens” and people will have sex regardless of religious training. Religious parents do a poor job of educating their children leaving them without the tools to make good decisions. That religious people have more guilt about sex but do it just as much. That the effects of religion wear off fairly quickly for most people once they leave religion entirely. Finally, leaving religion improves sexual satisfaction dramatically for most people.

The full report can be downloaded at www.IPCpress.com on or after May 15, 2011. Dr. Ray is available for comment, discussion or interviews.

About the principle researchers:
Dr. Darrel W. Ray, is a psychologist, director of The Institute for Performance Culture and author of the best selling book The God Virus: How Religion Infects Our Lives and Culture and author of two books on organizational psychology. In his career he has been interviewed for the Wall Street Journal, ABC News Nightline, and many other media sources. He has spoken throughout North America as well as
Ireland and the UK. His new book, Sex and God: How Religion Distorts Sexuality will be released in late 2011. Amanda Brown is an undergraduate at Kansas University studying sex and sexuality.

For further information please visit www.ipcpress.com or Email publisher@ipcpress.com

Religiosity and Racism

In the "No shit, Sherlock!" category, I present this paper to you.  The Chronic Dependence Of Popular Religiosity Upon Dysfunctional Psychosociological Conditions by Gregory Paul, Evolutionary Psychology, 7(3): 398-441 (2009).  Which seems to be a follow-up to an article that I have regularly referred to when showing how detrimental religion is to society.

Abstract: Better understanding the nature, origin and popularity of varying levels of popular religion versus secularism, and their impact upon socioeconomic conditions and vice versa, requires a cross national comparison of the competing factors in populations where opinions are freely chosen. Utilizing 25 indicators, the uniquely extensive Successful Societies Scale reveals that population diversity and immigration correlate weakly with 1st world socioeconomic conditions, and high levels of income disparity, popular religiosity as measured by differing levels of belief and activity, and rejection of evolutionary science correlate strongly negatively with improving conditions. The historically unprecedented socioeconomic security that results from low levels of progressive government policies appear to suppress popular religiosity and creationist opinion, conservative religious ideology apparently contributes to societal dysfunction, and religious prosociality and charity are less effective at improving societal conditions than are secular government programs. The antagonistic relationship between better socioeconomic conditions and intense popular faith may prevent the existence of nations that combine the two factors. The nonuniversality of strong religious devotion, and the ease with which large populations abandon serious theism when conditions are sufficiently benign, refute hypotheses that religious belief and practice are the normal, deeply set human mental state, whether they are superficial or natural in nature. Instead popular religion is usually a superficial and flexible psychological mechanism for coping with the high levels of stress and anxiety produced by sufficiently dysfunctional social and especially economic environments. Popular nontheism is a similarly casual response to superior conditions.

You really need to click on the link to the PDF and read it.  Just trust me on this!  This excellent article in the NYT is what led me to it.

Why do Americans still dislike atheists?
By Gregory Pauland Phil Zuckerman, Published: April 29

Long after blacks and Jews have made great strides, and even as homosexuals gain respect, acceptance and new rights, there is still a group that lots of Americans just don’t like much: atheists. Those who don’t believe in God are widely considered to be immoral, wicked and angry. They can’t join the Boy Scouts. Atheist soldiers are rated potentially deficient when they do not score as sufficiently “spiritual” in military psychological evaluations. Surveys find that most Americans refuse or are reluctant to marry or vote for nontheists; in other words, nonbelievers are one minority still commonly denied in practical terms the right to assume office despite the constitutional ban on religious tests.

Rarely denounced by the mainstream, this stunning anti-atheist discrimination is egged on by Christian conservatives who stridently — and uncivilly — declare that the lack of godly faith is detrimental to society, rendering nonbelievers intrinsically suspect and second-class citizens.

Continues @ http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-do-americans-still-dislike-atheists/2011/02/18/AFqgnwGF_story.html.

Certainly does not paint a rosy picture for those who insist that religion is some sort of force for good.  If anything, the data seems to indicate the exact opposite.  Now there is a large argument to make about correlation and causation.  However, with the US being the only outlier in the data, things are hard to line up if you want to remain in the area of countries that are considered first world.  Although, I think if you open up the bin, and compare nations that do not rank so high in economic and technological advancement, it would still look very bad for religiosity and societal well being.

Another telling bit of data would be the breakdown of how each state within the United States ranks.  Again, if you look at the more secular states, and they are much better off than the more religious states.  Not only by crime statistics, but by the "seven deadly sins" aggregates!  Kansas State University has created this amazing map of sin by plotting per-capita statistics on things like violent crime (wrath) , STDs (lust) and gluttony (fast food joints).


In other words,not only are religious people deluded, they are dangerous hypocrites.  But like I said, "No shit, Sherlock!"

How did everyone else miss this?

So today is the Jewish Zombie day.  People will celebrate it by observing the pagan rituals and holidays of Ishtar and Oaester, all the while thinking they are observing xtian rituals... How is it that these events were missed my everyone else?  If the passage quoted in the snarky picture really happened, why is it that no one noticed?  Yet one more example of how really fucked up this fairy tale is...

The total lack of evidence has been discussed quite a few times.  And the total lack of historical reference only backs up the initial statement I made about all the historians seemingly missing major events like this.


Again, you are free to believe whatever crazy shit you want to.  It's not my place to get into it if you are happy with it.  Just remember though that as soon as you put it out there for criticism, your fairy tales will get the mocking they so richly deserve.  So do us all a favour, don't get all righteous about your jewish zombie.  We don't want to hear the "good news" because it's just plan silly and it makes us feel bad for you to see you behave in such an obviously brain damaged way.  Instead, respect our rights to follow our hearts, and we'll leave you to your devices as well.

And if you happen to see any zombies today, remember that the only way to deal with them is by a headshot.  Apparently, according to your myth, some Roman muffed the handling of his zombie, only stabbed him in the side, and now his zombie is responsible for some fucked up cult that is a convenient excuse for bigotry, hate, and downright idiotic beliefs...  And speaking of idiotic beliefs, this next picture just seems to sum up how silly things are if you think about the need for jebus and all that...

Praise Odin! (Pagan Origins of Ash Wednesday)

They say you learn something new every day.  Well, hopefully this will be a bit of learning for you.  It was for me.  I knew that my ancestors had a great influence on the world (just recite the days of the week as one instqance).  However, I bet that most godbotherers are totally unaware of the origin of Ash Wednesday.  Of course, that is to be exepcted, because being a strong theist generally involves an unawareness of the entire universe around them, and only focusing on the revealed words from a dude in a funny dress and hat (or whatever garb the nutter happens to wear).

Anyway, here is some interesting background history on this ritual from an Allyn Gibson:

Today is Ash Wednesday. I hadn’t realized.

A few years ago on Ash Wednesday I was out somewhere–a Barnes & Noble, I think, probably the one right near my house–and I saw a woman with the ashes marking her forehead. “Praise Odin,” I said to her. She looked at me oddly, said nothing, and walked away quickly. I couldn’t blame her; she was probably unaware of the pagan origins of Ash Wednesday. Christianity has pilfered virtually every practice and belief from non-Christian sources, enough so that it’s not unreasonable to ask if there’s an original bone in the Christian body, and Ash Wednesday came from the Norse.

Ash Wednesday is a relatively late addition to the Christian liturgical calendar, first surfacing in the tenth century according to accounts written in the eleventh. (To put things in perspective, Ash Wednesday is older than the Crusades or the Norman Conquest, younger than Charlemagne and Islam.) At least, its Christian practice dates to only a little more than a millennium ago. The Norse practice of Ash Wednesday goes back several hundred years earlier, when it was done to celebrate the deeds of Sigurd, the hero of the Volsung Saga, a character perhaps better known as Siegfried from the Ring of the Nibelung.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE REST OF THE ENTRY!

Or you could just go around punching people in the forehead!

A Proposal to End Religious Arguments

I found a list someone had posted on a forum that amused me. I don't fully or wholly agree with it, and some of the statements made are rather weak (to say the least), but it does speak to a rather New England attitude.  Mind your own business.  I think that's the biggest reason why I speak out so much against religion.  For too long religion has been so used to getting its way, and being deferred to all the time that they think that they own the place.  That's not, nor has it ever been, the truth.  Now they get upset and cranky when someone points out that they are bing bullies, or lying, or are just plain wrong.

So, given that the list isn't the best of all, but still says the basic gist of minding your own business, what do you think?

A Proposal to End Religious Arguments:

For Christians

America is not a "Christian country."
First and foremost, 100% of the United States population doesn't believe in Christianity. Until the day that this statistic is achieved, kindly shut the hell up.

The Constitution comes before the Bible.
"I have a problem with people who take the Constitution loosely and the Bible literally." - Bill Maher
Regardless of what the Bible says, while you live in this life, you will follow the rules of the country you live in. Secular law is sovereign. If you have a problem with this, you're more than welcome to hurry yourself to the next life so you can follow Biblical law exclusively.

Keep your nose out of other peoples' business!
Simply put, your ethics and political views don't license you to dictate the personal lives of other people.
If you're anti-abortion, don't get an abortion. If you're opposed to same-sex marriage, don't marry someone of the same sex. If you don't want other people to have abortions or same-sex marriages, TOUGH SHIT! It's their right to do those things; like it or not.

Religion is not a basis for enforcing a policy.
This one goes out to a number of political figures (Mike Huckabee, George W. Bush, George H. W. Bush, et al.):
Your personal beliefs, in a democracy or a republic, should never restrict the rights of others. Since we live in the United States, which is a federal constitutional republic, the justification of unconstitutional laws with the religious views of one person is a threat to freedom and should not be allowed.

Keep your religion away from the throats of others.
Before you discuss religion with anyone, ask them if they're interested in hearing your bullshit. If they say, "No," it doesn't mean you are authorized to continue forcing your beliefs down their throat. Forcing your beliefs onto others is the equivalent of theological rape.

Research unverified claims.
A large majority of Americans would not vote for a qualified Atheist President. This is because of an unverified belief that atheists are immoral; which is utterly unacceptable.
Instead of basing your votes on superficial qualifications (religion, gender, political party, race, age, etc.), why not base your vote on something concrete? I'd rather have a competent President than a Christian president of lesser competence; would you disagree?

For Muslims

Stop trying to enforce Sharia law.
As I just finished saying to the Christians, secular law is sovereign. You're free to follow whatever laws you wish, but don't force them onto other people. To do so is a violation of their basic human liberties.

Stop blaming everything on the Jews.
There are more Muslims than Jews in the world; you can't blame all of your hardships on them. Shut the fuck up and take responsibility for your own predicaments. (This only really applies to the radicals.)

For the "Church" of Scientology

No compromise for you. You aren't a religion, you're a cult. Crash and burn, you fascist bastards!

For Atheists

Let History remain intact.
I am in support of laws preventing new court houses from displaying the Bible's 10 Commandments, but I am adamantly opposed from removing existing ones. Why?
Two words: Historical value.

Unless your rights are being stepped on, shut the fuck up.
If Congress ever passed a law requiring all students to recite the Pledge of Allegiance, then I might relate to removing "Under God" from the oath. Since that is not the case, and you are not required to recite it, stop wasting our time with irrelevant bullshit.

Liars for jebus

I just found this great website called "Liars for jebus" (well, okay, it's really "Liars for Jesus" but I prefer Homer's designation).  And it seems to be very consistent in what I have been saying for a long time about the outright LIES that these theitrad fuckwits have been doing.  Just because they don't like something, they would ratehr twist and lie instead of accepting that things aren't always like their fantasies.  There is a rampant Christian nationalist revisionism of American history, and not only is it pissing me off, but it is pissing a lot of other people off.

Anyway, this web page is a good source, and really does a good job debunking the revisionist tripe.  Not that I haven't mentioned this shit before...  Basically I think most of those fucktards subscribe to the school of "If you repeat a lie often enough, it will somehow become the truth."  Sadly, as I mentioned yesterday, facts and truth doesn't work that way.  If you are wrong in your opinions, it doesn't matter what rhetoric you throw up, you're still wrong.

USA Today: Science and religion aren't friends

I wonder how many people went ballistic reading this?  Why is it that when someone says something that is true, just because they disagree with it, they get so angry?  In the arena of reality, an opinion isn't a fact.  A fact is a fact, and your opinions are not worth anything should they disagree with facts.  No matter how much you may deny it, and attempt to use rhetoric and plain old lying to try to align the two.  And after a while, you should lose any measure of respect those around you may have had for you.  I just tend to tolerate fools much less than others, so if you are willfully ignorant and persist in thinking wrong is right, I will not coddle you.  I will heap scorn and derision on you as you deserve.  As John Wayne was purported to have said, "Life is hard.  It's harder if you're stupid."  And while I may not agree with him on many other philosophies, that is one that I can agree with him.  Sadly, society as a whole is starting to pay the price.  Now Americans aren't only the most obnoxious, mono-linguistic, arrogant bastards in the world, we are quickly becoming the most uneducated, and unteachable...

Science and religion aren't friends

Religion in America is on the defensive.

Atheist books such as The God Delusion and The End of Faith have, by exposing the dangers of faith and the lack of evidence for the God of Abraham, become best-sellers. Science nibbles at religion from the other end, relentlessly consuming divine explanations and replacing them with material ones. Evolution took a huge bite a while back, and recent work on the brain has shown no evidence for souls, spirits, or any part of our personality or behavior distinct from the lump of jelly in our head. We now know that the universe did not require a creator. Science is even studying the origin of morality. So religious claims retreat into the ever-shrinking gaps not yet filled by science. And, although to be an atheist in America is still to be an outcast, America's fastest-growing brand of belief is non-belief.

But faith will not go gentle. For each book by a "New Atheist," there are many others attacking the "movement" and demonizing atheists as arrogant, theologically ignorant, and strident. The biggest area of religious push-back involves science. Rather than being enemies, or even competitors, the argument goes, science and religion are completely compatible friends, each devoted to finding its own species of truth while yearning for a mutually improving dialogue.

As a scientist and a former believer, I see this as bunk. Science and faith are fundamentally incompatible, and for precisely the same reason that irrationality and rationality are incompatible. They are different forms of inquiry, with only one, science, equipped to find real truth. And while they may have a dialogue, it's not a constructive one. Science helps religion only by disproving its claims, while religion has nothing to add to science.

Irreconcilable

"But surely," you might argue, "science and religion must be compatible. After all, some scientists are religious." One is Francis Collins, head of the National Institutes of Health and an evangelical Christian. But the existence of religious scientists, or religious people who accept science, doesn't prove that the two areas are compatible. It shows only that people can hold two conflicting notions in their heads at the same time. If that meant compatibility, we could make a good case, based on the commonness of marital infidelity, that monogamy and adultery are perfectly compatible. No, the incompatibility between science and faith is more fundamental: Their ways of understanding the universe are irreconcilable.

Science operates by using evidence and reason. Doubt is prized, authority rejected. No finding is deemed "true" — a notion that's always provisional — unless it's repeated and verified by others. We scientists are always asking ourselves, "How can I find out whether I'm wrong?" I can think of dozens of potential observations, for instance — one is a billion-year-old ape fossil — that would convince me that evolution didn't happen.

Physicist Richard Feynman observed that the methods of science help us distinguish real truth from what we only want to be true: "The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool."

Science can, of course, be wrong. Continental drift, for example, was laughed off for years. But in the end the method is justified by its success. Without science, we'd all live short, miserable and disease-ridden lives, without the amenities of medicine or technology. As Stephen Hawking proclaimed, science wins because it works.

Does religion work? It brings some of us solace, impels some to do good (and others to fly planes into buildings), and buttresses the same moral truths embraced by atheists, but does it help us better understand our world or our universe? Hardly. Note that almost all religions make specific claims about the world involving matters such as the existence of miracles, answered prayers wonder-working saints and divine cures, virgin births, annunciations and resurrections. These factual claims, whose truth is a bedrock of belief, bring religion within the realm of scientific study. But rather than relying on reason and evidence to support them, faith relies on revelation, dogma and authority. Hebrews 11:1 states, with complete accuracy, "Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen." Indeed, a doubting-Thomas demand for evidence is often considered rude.

And this leads to the biggest problem with religious "truth": There's no way of knowing whether it's true. I've never met a Christian, for instance, who has been able to tell me what observations about the universe would make him abandon his beliefs in God and Jesus. (I would have thought that the Holocaust could do it, but apparently not.) There is no horror, no amount of evil in the world, that a true believer can't rationalize as consistent with a loving God. It's the ultimate way of fooling yourself. But how can you be sure you're right if you can't tell whether you're wrong?

The religious approach to understanding inevitably results in different faiths holding incompatible "truths" about the world. Many Christians believe that if you don't accept Jesus as savior, you'll burn in hell for eternity. Muslims hold the exact opposite: Those who see Jesus as God's son are the ones who will roast. Jews see Jesus as a prophet, but not the messiah. Which belief, if any, is right? Because there's no way to decide, religions have duked it out for centuries, spawning humanity's miserable history of religious warfare and persecution.

In contrast, scientists don't kill each other over matters such as continental drift. We have better ways to settle our differences. There is no Catholic science, no Hindu science, no Muslim science — just science, a multicultural search for truth. The difference between science and faith, then, can be summed up simply: In religion faith is a virtue; in science it's a vice.

But don't just take my word for the incompatibility of science and faith — it's amply demonstrated by the high rate of atheism among scientists. While only 6% of Americans are atheists or agnostics, the figure for American scientists is 64%, according to Rice professor Elaine Howard Ecklund's book, Science vs. Religion. Further proof: Among countries of the world, there is a strong negative relationship between their religiosity and their acceptance of evolution. Countries like Denmark and Sweden, with low belief in God, have high acceptance of evolution, while religious countries are evolution-intolerant. Out of 34 countries surveyed in a study published in Science magazine, the U.S., among the most religious, is at the bottom in accepting Darwinism: We're No. 33, with only Turkey below us. Finally, in a 2006 Time poll a staggering 64% of Americans declared that if science disproved one of their religious beliefs, they'd reject that science in favor of their faith.

'Venerable superstition'

In the end, science is no more compatible with religion than with other superstitions, such as leprechauns. Yet we don't talk about reconciling science with leprechauns. We worry about religion simply because it's the most venerable superstition — and the most politically and financially powerful.

Why does this matter? Because pretending that faith and science are equally valid ways of finding truth not only weakens our concept of truth, it also gives religion an undeserved authority that does the world no good. For it is faith's certainty that it has a grasp on truth, combined with its inability to actually find it, that produces things such as the oppression of women and gays, opposition to stem cell research and euthanasia, attacks on science, denial of contraception for birth control and AIDS prevention, sexual repression, and of course all those wars, suicide bombings and religious persecutions.

And any progress — not just scientific progress — is easier when we're not yoked to religious dogma. Of course, using reason and evidence won't magically make us all agree, but how much clearer our spectacles would be without the fog of superstition!

Jerry A. Coyne is a professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolution at The University of Chicago. His latest book is Why Evolution is True, and his website is http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/.

Fundamentalists - Islamic and Christian - they all fear vaginas

I just got this email from someone, and it cracked me up.  And fundamentally it's pretty true and accurate too.  I think that one of the sad parts about this is that most of the American fundies won't recognize themselves in it.

Fundamentalists - Islamic and Christian - they all fear vaginas

April 20th, 2010 by VinceWade1 

The war against Al Qaeda, the war against the Taliban, the war against an
alphabet soup of Islamic terrorists who view Christians as Infidels.why is
there this Big Struggle between the fundamentalists of Islam and
Christianity? They are a lot alike. Both fear vaginas.

In case you haven't noticed, religious fundamentalists of all stripes tend
to be more alike than different. Their bedrock belief that their religion is
the only true faith is a trait they have in common. The notion that a
Supreme Being might accept homage from a infinite number of earthly
religions is an alien concept to them. By the reasoning of some Christian
fundamentalists Mohandas Ghandi (Mohandas was his given name, Mahatma was a
title of respect), one of the most morally principled and spiritual men of
modern history, is doomed to hell because he wasn't "saved" by being "born
again." But as someone noted, what should we expect from people who
vehemently dismiss the idea that we evolved from a lower life form yet
accept without question the biblical assertion that we came from dirt?

Something else religious fundamentalists have in common is fear of the
mysterious power of vaginas to threaten male dominance and control.
Virtually every major religion in the world is ruled by men. Mythology and
folk tales through history and throughout the world feature magical or
virgin births. It's a way to deny that the belief systems' principal
character was conceived through the carnal penetration of a penis into a
vagina.

It's no secret that men crave the delight and powerfully intense
satisfaction of those warm, moist, tantalizing crevices. Just ask Tiger
Woods. Or Bill Clinton. Or Jimmy Swaggart. But that's precisely the issue.
Men both famous and not-so-famous have lost control when succumbing to
womanly charms. Earthly organized religion - not to be confused with real
spiritual belief - is largely about control through unquestioned obedience.
Since countless males throughout human history have been known to succumb to
the temptations of the tender trap, it makes a certain kind of sense that
behavior control freaks such as religious fundamentalists would want to
degrade and marginalize something that has such powerful control over the
population with external plumbing. The business of religion is controlling
the souls and wallets of men. Sex is competition for that control, and for
the contents of the wallet, so a man's pubic pursuits must be purified
through the prism of the pulpit.

The sex abuse scandals rocking the Roman Catholic Church are partly the
result of the hierarchy's stubborn insistence on priestly celibacy and
perpetual secondary roles for women in the organization's decision-making
machinery. Nowhere in the Gospels does Jesus demand priestly celibacy - or
male rule. His disciple Peter was a married man. Think Da Vinci Code.
Priestly celibacy didn't become mandatory until centuries after Jesus'
death. A case can be made that the ordained clergy of the Roman Catholic
Church is the world's most powerful and enduring males-only club that will
fight to the bitter end to keep it that way.

It's not just a Catholic thing. In a series of  investigative TV news
stories I did some years ago called "Preying from the Pulpit" I reported the
late Baptist fundamentalist preacher Jack Hyles of Indiana was obsessed with
the evils of sex in his Sunday sermons, even as his longtime mistress sat
behind his pulpit on one side while his wife sat on the other. Moreover,
Hyles' school for young fundamentalists used to put extraordinary focus on
pleasures of the flesh by insisting some of the more well-endowed female
students must wear Band-Aids over their nipples to avoid inflaming the
passions of their fellow "saved" male Christians.  Apparently Hyles
understood being "saved" is a transitory proposition no matter what you
proclaim from the pews on Sunday.

For those who doubt the similarity of sex control urges between
fundamentalist Muslims and Christians, I'd invite you to explore their views
in the own words. On the Christian side of fundamentalism there is a
treatise on The Submission of the Christian Wife or Submission Is Not a Foul
Word or simply, Submit to your Husband.

As for vagina-fearing  Muslims, an organization called MEMRI TV is an
excellent source of from-the-horse's-mouth-or-some-other-body-part video
clips about the Islamic compulsion to keep women in their place. The clips
are culled from Middle East TV so you'll have to read the subtitles, but
reading television has seldom been so interesting. 

Echoing Christian fundamentalism, there is the Islamic preacher who says a
woman should serve her husband like a maid; a woman's "strength" (quotes
added) lies in her weakness. Then there's the video to be envied by
Christian wife beaters everywhere in which faithful Muslims are advised that
if your wife bothers you or annoys you or you simply "suspect something"
then beat her - break her head.

All of this may make some wonder if we couldn't solve the Muslim/Christian
conflict that is driving so much military action in today's world by pushing
the politicians aside and having fundamentalist imams and preachers and
priests get together to find common ground in denigrating and demeaning
women. After, all it is written that it is Somebody-or-Other's will.

And again, theitards show they are pussies

Just ran across this post. Yet again I gather more data that shows that theitards are just a bunch of giant cry-baby pussies that really need to be dropped off this planet... Either that, or they are just jealous of how smoking hot she is!

Poland has blasphemy laws, too — and they're applying them to throw a pop star in prison. Dorota Rabczewska (careful there, she has also posed for Playboy) has said something absolutely unforgivably awful:

In a television interview last year, Doda explained that she found it far easier to believe in dinosaurs than the Bible; "it is hard to believe in something written by people who drank too much wine and smoked herbal cigarettes."

Polish Catholics weren't too pleased. Under Poland's draconian blasphemy law, simply offending someone's religious sensibilities can earn you hefty fines and even imprisonment.

Wait, that's it? One sentence that suggests that the authors of the Bible had been doped out of their minds, and zoom, off to prison for two years? Touchy little cowards, aren't they…

This is a good comment, too:

How can Europeans cry foul when Muslims are offended by a cartoon, when they themselves press charges and demand imprisonment over something as simple as a pop star making negative statements about their religion?

Emphasis mine. Indeed, how? And what exactly is the punishment for raping and covering up the rape of children?

Legally and religiously sanctioned rapist

Okay, today I am going to slam another branch of theitardism, muslims. Mostly because what I read today made me physically ill... Of course, the good xtians will all be outraged and smug in their supposed superiority, totally ignoring their hypocrisy in hiding and enabling equally systemic child abuse... And of course, pointing that hypocrisy out is persecution and discrimination in their eyes. Well, they can just go fuck themselves (instead of children) too.

Yemeni Child Bride Dies of Internal Bleeding Days After Wedding

Like a couple of other Middle Eastern Muslim nations, Yemen has a problem with little girls being married off to older men -- and it's a problem that just keeps getting worse. The latest incident involves a 12-year-old girl married to a man at least twice as old as her. Just three days after the wedding, she died of internal bleeding caused by intercourse with her "husband" (that should probably read "legally and religiously sanctioned rapist").

It's not clear to what degree Yemeni officials are truly outraged over this and to what degree they are only outraged because of the international attention they are getting. Even if they were genuinely outraged, though, how easy would it be for them to change the religious culture of the people in their nation? A third of all girls in Yemen are married before they are 18 and most of them are married off to men who already have multiple wives. The parents are no help because they are happy to be rid of girls in a religious culture where females just aren't valued -- except perhaps for child-bearing and sex.

Catholic Church: Giant Pussies

It's not bad enough that the church can't stand up to irreverence and scrutiny about their bronze age dogma (i.e. hunkering down behind "Blasphemy Laws"), now they are striving ardently to protect their little pedophile club. That's right, Connecticut wants to remove the statue of limitations on sex crimes comitted against children. So who should raise their creepy voice to oppose this? NAMBLA? The Connecticut Pedophile Prisoners Association? Nope, it's the catholic church.

Now, I understand that painting with a broad brush is not fully warranted, but the incredible lack of leadershi and even acknowledgement is staggering. The popedope hasn't said anything about the expanding scandal. The incompetent mouthpieces he's allowed to speak on the subject have been insulting at best. really, is this organization that fucked up? Oh yeah, they believe in magic skyfaries... I suppose I should have answerd that for myself.

I like how PZ Myers summed it up:

The reason they oppose it isn't some conservative legal principle. They spilled the beans already — it's the cost to the church.

The proposed change to the law would put "all Church institutions, including your parish, at risk," says the letter, which was signed by Connecticut's three Roman Catholic bishops.

Oh? Why are they worried? Do they have a gang of septuagenarian child
molesters tucked away somewhere in the bosom of the Connecticut church?

The poor babies... here is the CNN Story. You can't make this shit up!


Hartford, Connecticut (CNN) -- A bill in Connecticut's legislature that would remove the statute of limitations on child sexual abuse cases has sparked a fervent response from the state's Roman Catholic bishops, who released a letter to parishioners Saturday imploring them to oppose the measure.

Under current Connecticut law, sexual abuse victims have 30 years past their 18th birthday to file a lawsuit. The proposed change to the law would rescind that statute of limitations.

The proposed change to the law would put "all Church institutions, including your parish, at risk," says the letter, which was signed by Connecticut's three Roman Catholic bishops.

The letter is posted on the Web site of the Connecticut Catholic Public Affairs Conference, the public policy and advocacy office of Connecticut's Catholic bishops. It asks parishioners to contact their legislators in opposition of the bill.

The "legislation would undermine the mission of the Catholic Church in Connecticut, threatening our parishes, our schools, and our Catholic Charities," the letter says.

The Catholic archdiocese of Hartford also published a pulpit announcement on its Web site, which was to be read during Mass on Sunday, urging parishioners to express opposition to the bill.

The bill has been revised to address some of the church's concerns about frivolous abuse claims against it, according to Connecticut state Rep. Beth Bye, one of the bill's sponsors.

"The church didn't recognize that this bill makes improvements," Bye said. "The victims -- their lives have been changed and some will never recover from years of sexual abuse. For me, it's about giving them access to the courts."

Under the bill's provisions, anyone older than 48 who makes a sex abuse claim against the church would need to join an existing claim filed by someone 48 or younger. Older claimants would need to show substantial proof that they were abused.

"They were worried about frivolous lawsuits and so we made the bar high," Bye said.

The bill does not target the Catholic Church, she said.

The bishops' letter raised concerns that the bill would allow claims that are 70 years or older, in which "key individuals are deceased, memories have been faded, and documents and other evidence have been lost." The letter said that the majority of cases would be driven by "trial lawyers hoping to profit from these cases."

The bill passed in Connecticut's House of Representatives, and Bye said the state Senate should vote on it in the next week or two.

Did you hear about the Gay Pedophile Priest? Of Course you did!

As I said in a previous post, it comes in threes (this time it's the old pedophelia story). I couldn't be happier to see it happening to a prominent symbol of the waste and excess (not to mention abuse and hypocricy) of the roman catholic church. While I have nothing but sympathy for all the victims involved in both the sex abuse scandal as well as the male prostitutes (who are probably not all willing participants in the work), I can't help but to feel glee at the misfortune of the church. As far as I am concerned, it is nothing but an agent of ignorance and evil. All the good that the church has done in its lifetime is IN SPITE of being part of the church, NOT because it was part of the church.

I mean seriously, just because a guy is the supposed conduit for magical skyfairy makes him infallible? And the policies the church condones? Did you know that they didn't stop killing witches oficially until well into the 19th century in Italy (not to mention it still goes on in the name of the church in Africa). And their policies toward responsible reprodctive rights and women's rights are still medieval. Even taking 500 years to apologize for the persection of Galileio shows their reluctance to really embrace reality.

And the OBSENE amount of wealth they have... That right there just pisses me off to no end. So jewish sky zombie is omnipotent, but can't balance his fucking checkbook? Yeah right!

If you saw an organization like this centered around anything else aside from religion, it would be so blatantly obvious that it's a scam that you'd of course have nothing to do with it. But as soon as it centers around the delusion of imaginary friends, it has worldwide support... And the way this organization works is really no different than protestants, baptists, or what have you. They are all fucking batshit crazy. And they all have ludicrious wealth that serves very little purpose.

Anyway, I just hope this is the start of a general downfall and disilliosnionment with religion. Of course, anyone who isn't catholic will gloat saying that of course the catholics are wrong, and their version of batshit crazy is The One True Truth... Sound familiar?

It comes in threes

Well, we had delicious irony yesterday. Now we have a bunch of men wearing dresses involved in a gay prostitution scandal (No, not queens, but the Vatican!). For comedy's sake, I wish to invoke the silly rule of threes, so I wonder what the next outrageously hypocritical thing will happen next?

Vatican chorister and usher in gay prostitution scandal

One of Pope Benedict's ceremonial ushers and a member of an elite choir in St Peter's Basilica have been implicated in a gay prostitution ring, in the latest sexual scandal to taint the Vatican.

Ghinedu Ehiem, a Nigerian, was dismissed by the Vatican from a prestigious choir after his name appeared in transcripts of police wiretaps.

In the wiretaps, Mr Eheim is allegedly heard negotiating over the procurement of male prostitutes.

The wiretaps were carried out in connection with a probe into corruption in contracts to build public works, including the planned venue in Sardinia of last year's G8 summit.

Among four people arrested last month in the corruption probe was Angelo Balducci, an engineer who is a board member of Italy's public works department and a construction consultant to the Vatican.

Balducci is also a member of an elite group called "Gentlemen of His Holiness" – ushers who are called to serve in the Vatican's Apostolic Palace on major occasions such as when the pope receives heads of state or presides at big events.

Balducci was arrested on corruption charges and the allegations of prostitution emerged only later.

Excerpts of the wiretaps and police documents published in the Italian newspaper La Repubblica showed that Ehiem, 40, had been in regular contact with Balducci before Balducci's arrest last month and the subject of their conversation was gay sex.

A police document prepared for magistrates and published in part by La Repubblica said Balducci was in contact with Ehiem and an Italian who were part of what the police called "an organised network ... to abet male prostitution".

It was not immediately possible to contact Ehiem's lawyer.

A Vatican source said Balducci, who is still in jail, has been dismissed from the elite group of ushers and that his name would not appear in the next edition of the Vatican's directory.

"He obviously can't come back here after being accused of these things," the source told Reuters.

The latest black eye for the Vatican comes on the heels of major paedophilia scandals involving the abuse of children by priests in Ireland, Germany and the United States.

Balducci's lawyer, Franco Coppi, one of Italy's highest profile lawyers, said he had no comment on the newest accusations against his client, saying: "We have much more serious things to be concerned with right now," referring to the corruption charges.

Science education inoculates against religion

So I saw this blog in my feed today. I went over to read it just to see what the author had to say. At first I was hopeful that there was some correlation like IQ vs Religiosity, but I really don't see that. To me, it just seems that the more devout someone is, the more they will run away from learning about the world around them. They can't handle the fact that their impotent little god hardly has an gaps to hide in as it is, so they just cover their eyes and ears and hope nothing gets in.

Some are more active about it, and even try to keep other people who may actually want to learn (Texas Board of [un]-Education anyone?), but hopefully more and more rational people will stand up to those fucktards, and kick them to the curb where they belong. SO while this paper was somewhat positive to me, it just reminded me that it's more a result of some of these cretins willfully ignoring science, and swallowing up every lie they can find that supports their incredibly fucked up view of the world.

Science education inoculates against religion

At the back end of 2007, I wrote that science education doesn't inoculate against religion. But the time has come to indulge in a bit of revisionism.

Here's why. Darren Sherkat (who has a paper out on religious fundamentalism and verbal ability that I covered in the previous post) has also taken a look at the link with scientific knowledge. The paper isn't published yet, but he sent me the manuscript - and he's also blogged it, if you want the 'horse's mouth' version!

As before, this is an analysis of the US General Social Survey, which includes a set of 13 questions on general science topics. As you can see in the graph, people who think the Bible is a book of fables scored nearly 40% higher that those who think it is the literal word of God.

You get a similar result for people who are members of Conservative Protestant sects. What's more, it persists even after controlling for other factors that might explain the difference - like age, education, income, race, immigrant status and region.

It seems that there is something about conservative Christianity in the US that works directly against science skills. In part, this might be down to the nature of the questions.

Sherkat omitted from the analysis the question about evolution, but there are also questions about continental drift and also the Big Bang. A Young Earth Creationist, might give the wrong answer to these even though they had been taught the correct answer.

So why did I previously suggest no link between science proficiency and religiosity? Well, I looked at international student scores on science collected by PISA, and correlated these with data on how often people in those countries prayed. I didn't find any link.

But Sherkat's work suggests that the link is strongest with people who have a rather extreme attachment to their religion. So I went back and redid the analysis, using the latest religious data from the World Values Survey.

This time I looked at people who rated themselves '10' on a 10-point scale asking how important God is in their life. This is a question that really picks out the very devout.

It turns out that countries with a lot of these really devout people do very poorly at educating their children about science.

In a way that's not too surprising, because these countries also tend to be poorer and less well educated in general.

But PISA also provide data adjusted for socioeconomic differences between the countries. So this score reflects how effective countries are at educating their children on science, after taking into account their different circumstances.

The data are only available for OECD countries, but that's good because these countries are broadly similar to start with. Unfortunately, the WVS didn't collect religious data from all OECD countries, which makes the sample even smaller. But even so...

The remarkable fact is that even within this small, relatively homogenous, pool of countries there's still a significant correlation.

Although this is an ecological study (it didn't look at individual data, like Sherkat's can do with the GSS data), it does support his findings.

Either highly religious people shield their children from science, or good science education shifts people from being highly religious to a more moderate stance (or perhaps both, of course).

Either way, I'm going to have to revise my previous belief that science education and religion aren't linked!

__________________________________________________________________________
This article by Tom Rees was first published on Epiphenom. It is licensed under Creative Commons.

Pew Forum: How religious is your state?

Just going to paste the article in here (or you can click the title of this post and get there too). I will comment in that I am glad to be at the bottom of this list. And if you graphed it against education, income, quality of life, crime rates, teen pregnancies, etc., it would probably show a very high correlation. Although, those with an education and intelligence would probably already know that!

How Religious Is Your State?
Dec. 21, 2009
Which of the 50 states has the most religious population? Since there are many ways to define "religious," there is no single answer to this question. But to give a sense of how the states stack up, the Pew Research Center's Forum on Religion & Public Life used polling data to rank them on four measures: the importance of religion in people's lives, frequency of attendance at worship services, frequency of prayer and absolute certainty of belief in God. Mississippi stands out on all four, and several other Southern states also rank very high on the measures.
See how the states rank according to each of the four measures in the interactive graphic below.
States with sample sizes that are too small to analyze are combined. As a result, the lowest ranking is 46 rather than 50.

CLICK HERE FOR THE TABLE AND COOL INTERACTIVE FEATURES.

Maybe god hates the Republicans?

Okay, so the Republicans held a much publicized prayer to stop health care. Never mind that study after study has shown prayer to be totally ineffective. Although, with the votes that the Democrats had, this would have been a PERFECT chance for something supernatural to happen. Yet, nothing did, and old skydaddy gawd shows himself to be totally impotent and imaginary. Or, maybe, since the Republicans are so firm in their belief in this infallible skydaddy, he wants healthcare reform? Did they ever think of that? All the defeats of the GOP leading up to this is actually gawd telling them that he's on the side of the Democrats? Could it be?

Of course, the theitards will rationalize this with some sort of non-sense about god working in mysterious ways or testing them further. Well, that just seems like a really assholeish thing to do. Maybe he doesn't like you? I know I sure as heck don't like you!

Blogging and reading other blogs (Symptoms of Religious Addiction)

I read a lot of other blogs. No duh! Generally the blogs are ones of interest to me, but quite often, I try to read blogs that talk about things I am not familiar with. Actually BEING a theist is one thing that I am not familiar with. I attempted to trick myself into believing the bullshit when I was around 14, but it really was an exercise in futility. Being rational, and then attempting to be non-rational is like someone having eyesight wanting to gouge out their own eyes. As such, I really don't have a lot of experience with what people call "deconversion". I read Daniel Florien's blog on this because he's pretty funny. I read John Loftus's blog because he pulls no punches. Of course I read many non-theistic blogs too (about astronomy, science, art, computer games, etc.), but this particular entry is about one in particular.

The Redheaded Skeptic stopped by here one time and left me a comment. So I went and checked out her blog, and I was pleased to have another person's perspective on deconversion (my wife has her perspective too, but her version didn't seem to resonate with other's and she thinks more in pictures anyway so it's hard to articulate it). So while I can't offer anything on this, maybe she can. One of her entries particularly resonated with me though... Let's just say that in reality, strong theism is like a mental disorder, and this post sums it up quite well:

Josh posted a list of signs that one is addicted to religion, along with how he fit the criteria. I read it and definitely saw myself and my family.

The list can be found here and seems to describe fundamentalism at its core. It is as follows:

1. Inability to think, doubt, or question religious information and/or authority
2. Black-and-white, good/bad, either/or simplistic thinking: one way or the other
3. Shame-based belief that you aren’t good enough or you aren’t doing it right
4. Magical thinking that God will fix you/ do it all, without serious work on your part
5. Scrupulosity: rigid obsessive adherence to rules, codes of ethics, or guidelines
6. Uncompromising judgmental attitudes: readiness to find fault or evil out there
7. Compulsive or obsessive praying, going to church or crusades, quoting scripture
8. Unrealistic financial contributions
9. Believing that sex is dirty; believing our bodies or physical pleasures are evil
10. Compulsive overeating and/or excessive fasting
11. Conflict and argumentation with science, medicine, and education
12. Progressive detachment from the real work, isolation and breakdown of relationships
13. Psychosomatic illness: back pains, sleeplessness, headaches, hypertension
14. Manipulating scripture or texts, feeling specially chosen, claiming to receive special messages from God
15. Maintaining a religious “high”, trance-like state, keeping a happy face (or the belief that one should…)
16. Attitude of righteousness or superiority: “we versus the world,” including the denial of one’s human-ness.
17. Confusion, great doubts, mental, physical or emotional breakdown, cries for help

Verrrry interesting. I definitely fit almost every single criteria. Though I do wonder if it is based on anything scientific or the author’s own observations. This may not be a list of addiction symptoms, but rather fundamentalism. Is there a difference? That is for science to know and for us to find out! What do you think?

Now, I do want to mention, I also read blogs by the deluded. I have only commented on one (by invitation even). I don't repost what they have to say, because, well, it's the same lame shit over and over again. It's the same with any delusions that fly in the face of reality, like the birthers or people who deny evolution. All too often, people who attempt to debate theists/birthers/creationists end up having to sit through endless bad arguments and just plain silly assertions. And they get tiresome. Incredibly tiresome. So tiresome in fact that anyone caught in the endless web of theist/birther/creationist lies and deceptions usually just gets frustrated and leaves, handing the theist/birther/creationists a victory in their mind (a la pigeon playing chess analogy).